


Bittersweet Promises, Bittersweet Goodbyes

by afteriwake



Series: nongentorum [80]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anthea Is In Danger, F/M, For Her Safety, Goodbyes, Heartbreak, Heartbroken Mycroft Holmes, Idiots in Love, Last Kiss, Love Confessions, Mentioned Eurus Holmes, POV Mycroft Holmes, Past Anthea/Mycroft Holmes, Post-Episode: s04e01 The Six Thatchers, Pre-episode: s04e02 The Lying Detective, Promises, Worried Mycroft Holmes, bad timing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-27 05:37:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16212539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: Mycroft makes a decision that breaks his heart to keep Anthea safe.





	Bittersweet Promises, Bittersweet Goodbyes

**Author's Note:**

> Ages ago, when I first hit 900 followers on Tumblr, **kelseyrare** asked me to use the sentence “ _'I think I’ve been holding myself back from falling in love with you all over again.'_ ” in a Mythea fic for my nongentorum series. After the events of series 4 I'm finally getting around to writing it. Hope you enjoy, m'dear!

“I think I’ve been holding myself back from falling in love with you all over again.” He had his back to her because this was the only way he could force himself to have this conversation, if he didn’t look at her. He’d gone over the scenario in his head at least nine hundred times, and the only constant was that he had to not look her in the eyes. This was for her safety, he had to keep that thought first and foremost. “But you need to leave. You need to be reassigned, for your safety. I have...dangerous enemies, far closer than I would like to have.”

“Do you not think I can take care of myself?” Andrea asked from behind him.

“Not against her,” he said. “I don’t know how she does it, but her reach is not supposed to extend beyond her cell, and yet it does. And involving Moriarty in the affair was a poor decision on my part.”

“Your sister,” she murmured. “Mycroft, please don’t push me away.”

“Never that,” he said, giving in to the impulse to look at her. His one constant through the years, his one rock, the only person he trusted himself to lean on. “It’s temporary, hopefully. When the matter is settled, if it is settled, you can come back to my side.”

“And what if--”

“It’s best not to think of worst-case scenarios,” he said. “I’m trying not to. But she’s playing a game and I already know Sherlock is in the web she’s weaving, and John Watson too, most likely. She’s making cryptic remarks. If she finds out how I truly feel about you, Andrea...” He let himself trail off. “I would be bereft if anything happened to you.”

She nodded, looking down. He hoped she didn’t cry, because he would comfort her and then he would never let her go. She had taken his heart all those years ago, and while they had tried before the timing had been wrong. A strictly professional relationship was what they had decided on from here on out, but he had wanted more. He had always wanted more and he knew she had felt the same. But that simply wasn’t meant to be, at least not now. Perhaps in the future, they could…

But if that future would come into being he did not know. Eurus had been his responsibility from a young age when he was far too young to know he should have told everyone the truth about the mad sister in the cell. He should have told his parents their daughter was alive, should have stopped his brother’s memory from supplementing a dog named Redbeard in the place of Victor and Eurus.

Should have done so much, but he had been afraid, just as he was now.

And now it was all coming back to bite them in the arse, ever since Eurus had asked for Moriarty as a present that fateful Christmas. He should have said no, put his foot down, but to be quite frank, she terrified him more than their Uncle Rudy ever had. She had gotten her way, and look at where it left them now.

Alone. Forever alone, relying on nothing except family, and even family was slowly falling apart.

Andrea looked up. “You had better promise to come out of all of this alive, Mycroft. I won’t accept any other outcome.”

Mycroft gave her a faint smile. “If I die, will you journey to the Underworld to rescue me?”

“I’m not joking, Mycroft. This is not a laughing matter.”

“No, I didn’t mean to...” He sighed. “I was trying to inject some levity and that was the most inappropriate way I could, but I need...something. Something to convince me it will all turn out well, in the end.”

“How about a promise on my behalf?” Andrea asked.

Mycroft was quiet for a few moments. “I’m listening.”

“I promise if you live through whatever experience your sister chooses to put you through, we can try again. We can have another go at a romantic relationship. I’ll leave Her Majesty’s service and become as much a civilian as I’m able, and we’ll try again.” She got out of her seat and came up, gently cupping the side of his face. “We’ll make a proper go of it.”

“There’s no need to leave your position,” he said, his voice quiet as he shut his eyes and leaned into her touch. “But we’ll make an Honest to God attempt to make it work?”

“Yes,” she said. “I promise if you promise to do all you can to come out of this alive.”

“I promise, then,” he said. She removed her hand and then leaned in, pressing her lips to his. It was soft and he knew he could get carried away, turn it into a ravishing right there on the desk, but she pulled away before he had the chance and left his office in silence. It was a long time later that he opened his eyes and began the process he would need to undertake to move Andrea from his service to Lady Smallwood, perhaps, to keep her safe. He needed her safe because if he lost Andrea, life and everything else would be meaningless. Eurus would have won the battle and the war, and he could not let that happen.

Not now.


End file.
